


Ancients and Old Ones

by ArsenalOwl



Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-25 12:28:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21356272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArsenalOwl/pseuds/ArsenalOwl
Summary: An Oath of the Ancients paladin(er, squire) teams up with a Great Old One Warlock for an ill advised adventure.





	Ancients and Old Ones

**Author's Note:**

> This work started as a spin off of a Dungeons and Dragons one shot, and so it makes reference to some class mechanics. The story however was not created using or by actual play,

Peer Fazra swung her hammer with well practiced grace, and the ease of immense strength. She was used to such a swing leaving ruin where her enemies had once been, but she only managed to knock the hag aside. Birdlike and reeking of carrion, she - it looked like it should be fragile, but no amount of blunt force seemed to make a difference. 

Unperturbed, the orc knight kept swinging, knocking her quarry around the shaded woodland glade. All the while, her squire skirted the edges, sword at their side. Strikingly different, where Fazra was gray-green skinned, and towering, Malakel was slight, and their skin was pale and almost pearlescent. Malakel eyed the struggling figures, and their eyes dropped down to Fazra’s belt, where a short sword hung, made of living wood from the Iron Wood Tree. It was inimical to fae creatures, and Fazra could finish the fight a good deal quicker if she wasn’t so hammer happy. 

Still, the onslaught kept the hag’s claws at bay, as well as whatever magic it could bring to bear. This gave Malakel the chance to sneak to the side, lift their sword, and thrust it into the creature’s left side, just below the ribcage, all the way to the hilt. The other end came out of its belly, and it squawked in surprise. The squawk turned into a cruel laugh, and the hag brought its hands down to the protruding tip of the sword, heedless of its edge, and began to push it back. 

Malakel closed their eyes, and reached deep down for the divine spark, from the drop of angelic blood somewhere in their family’s ancient past. They found it, and their hair, lavender and already shining more than the dim forest light should allow, began to glow. Pale purple flames leaked from between their fingers clenched around the sword’s hilt. The flames flowed down the blade, jumping playfully, but each spark floated back to join the stream of holy fire. 

Where fire met fae, sparks flew, green and yellow. The creature’s laughter transformed back into cries of pain, and it twisted around, trying to free itself from the blade. Malakel advanced to keep their blade deep in the hag’s belly, and looked to their master, almost pleadingly. 

“Peer, please, the Iron Wood!”

They couldn’t keep this up for very long, but they shouldn't need to. Fae creatures feel both pleasure and pain much more intensely than mortals do; despite being eternal, they often didn’t conceptualize anything past what they were feeling in the moment, and that would be the key to beating them. A fae could not break their word, so to beat a creature that can’t die, the trick is to extract promises to behave themselves, typically under duress(though actual bargains are sometimes necessary). 

Fazra obliged, dropping her hammer to the forest floor with a muffled thud, and drawing the short, poorly shaped sword from their belt. Malakel eyed it again in distaste for the way their master treated the holy weapon. Fazra rammed it into the hag’s chest, above the collarbone. She used so much force that it went all the way through, and into the tree behind it.   
“There,” Fazra said, dropping her hands, to leave the hag pinned into the wood. “Make the deal.”

“But, that’s your duty.” They didn’t mean to be petulant, but Fazra often delegated tasks she didn’t care for to them, regardless of the importance. Tasks Fazra didn’t care for usually meant anything that wasn’t fighting. 

“Well, if you want to be Peer Malakel some day, you better start doing this some time.”

“I - Yes Peer Fazra.” They turned to the creature, bringing the sword’s hilt down to their hip so they could stand up straight without withdrawing it.   
“Creature, silence yourself.” It did not. “Swear never to eat the flesh of a mortal again, for as long as you walk this plane.”

The creature shrieked in protest, and Fazra cut in, “It’ll never go for that; like asking a man to stop drinking water.” She stood back watching, leaning on the haft of her hammer, her weight added to it and making an indentation in the soft earth. 

Malakel glared briefly at Fazra, then back at the hag, “Leave this place, and never again come within a thousand leagues of where we stand.”

“Are you training to be a paladin, or a lawyer? Get on with it.”

“A hundred!” The hag cried, its voice like a raven imitating a woman.

“I said - “

But Fazra cut in, “That’ll do,” she put her hand on the hilt of her short sword, “Give us that oath, and I’ll pull it out.” 

“I will leave this place,” she cried between sobs of pain, “and never again come within a hundred leagues!”

Fazra pulled the blade, and Malakel reluctantly followed suit. They couldn’t hold the holy fire any longer, in any case, and felt relief as it flowed back up the blade and into their skin. 

“Not so hard, eh? Now beat it!” she lifted her hammer one handed, as she wiped the blood from her sword on the hem of her tabard, and swung it at the hag’s retreating head. She missed, but laughed as it ran away, head bobbing like a chicken. 

Malakel watched it too, but with a frown. “It will just set up in the woods around another village or town.”

Fazra hefted the hammer onto her shoulder, “And that town’ll pay us another ten gold bits, and drown us in booze, just like we’ll see tonight. Sharpen that,” she shoved the still-bloodied blade into her squire’s hand. “You love the old twig so much. And learn to accept that some problems can’t be solved, just moved elsewhere.”

The pair made their way back to Alvadale, the town that had contracted them to do away with the hag. It was a reasonably short walk in what was now, the threat gone, a very pleasant sort of wood. If anything might be wrong, it was that it was too quiet, but the natural inhabitants of the area would soon learn that this part of their domain was once again safe. 

Fazra and Malakel walked side by side, in almost uninterrupted silence. Peer Fazra was heavily armored where she bothered to wear any. She had a breast plate, cuisse and greaves, but her thick arms were bare and her feet were in plain hunting boots. Malakel was lighter, but more fully equipped. They had a brigandine of green dyed leather, rivets showing where steel plates were embedded under the surface. On their arms there was a pair of bracers, and like Fazra they had some light plating on their legs. They carried a longsword at their waist, with a dagger next to it. All of their attire could be covered by a gray cloak that they wore clasped about the neck, though now it was over their shoulder so it trailed behind them. 

Presently, the town came into view through the trees. It was a smallish town that sat at a crossroad of Lord’s Road and the Old Stone Way, which made it a good place for travelers to stop for a night. There were two inns, the Crossroads(or called the Crossed Roads by some), and the Stick Deer. The latter was meant to be called the Dancing Stag or something similar, but the proprietor was a poor artist, and the deer made of simple lines gave it a different name. By agreement, one brewed beer and kept white wines, and the other had an apiary to make mead and served red. This way they didn’t impede each other’s business too badly. 

In addition to the inns, there was a stable, owned by the blacksmith and farrier in town. There was an ever changing roster of horses here, as riders in a hurry would trade one out as they passed by. Some of these horses were regulars, even if the people riding them were often different, and the local children had a game of betting which one would check in next. The rules to this game were either convoluted, or inconsistent; the adults in town hadn’t figured out which. 

The first local to see the paladin and her squire coming called from her rocking chair for her grandchild to run to the Stick Deer and announce their return. By the time they had gotten to the outskirts there was a fair crowd, mostly townsfolk, but a few passersthrough came out just to see what the fuss was. There was a nervous kind of excitement to this waiting, it was late enough that some figured the two might have given up for the day, but the anxiety broke out into elation when Peer Fazra raised her hand into a simple thumbs-up gesture. A cheer went up from the crowd(and a handful of coins changed hands surreptitiously), and it didn’t stop as they crossed the threshold and entered the throng. 

“The creature is gone, and will never return!” Fazra announced, and the noise became even greater. Even the outsiders who only stopped out of curiosity found the celebration infectious. 

Fazra was right about the booze. The reeve in town gave them the agreed ten gold pieces, but the townsfolk collectively added half as much again paying their tab at the inn. Fazra even let the blacksmith buy her the biggest room, leaving Malakel with the smaller one they had shared when they arrived. 

Malakel stayed in their room for a time, listening and smiling despite themself at the sounds of revelry below. They were working on the sword, as ordered. The hilt was made from a bough of the ancient Iron Wood Tree, which stood at the center of their Order’s castle, Horschnell. It was the closest thing to a god that they had, though there was no dogma to their sort of religion. The tree’s most notable property, was the living iron core to its trunk and branches. It imbibed the blood of anything that pricked itself on the barbs of the tree, taking the iron from it to grow further. 

The blade already had some extra burs from the hag’s blood, and maybe had grown a quarter inch. Malakel cleaned it well, then cut the inside of their own wrist to give it more, holding the sword upside down so that the blood flowed to the tip. They held the blade close to their face, so they could watch the almost crystalline growth of the blade. It was small, and slow, but mesmerizing when one paid attention to it. As the Iron Wood did its work, they sat cross legged, with their cut arm in their lap, ignoring the pale holy fire that sprang up to heal the wound. 

When it was done, Malakel cleaned blade, wound and floor(they had been careful not to get any on their clothes) and took a whetstone to the blade, as well as a small knife. With the stone, they ground off the burs that deformed the blade, and worked to keep the edge a proper bevel. The knife was used to scrape away any of the wooden bark that tried to grow onto the blade from the hilt. The hilt was a piece of living Iron Wood, cut and carved to hold two hands comfortably, despite the shortness of the blade(a result of its owner’s neglect). It was bounded with bronze on either end, a simple round pommel and straight crossguard. The bronze wouldn’t fuse with iron, and usually kept the wooden part of the hilt from spreading, but it had to be tended to sometimes. 

Malakel stood, maintenance done(properly, for once), and slid the sword into the too-large oaken scabbard. It would need a new one made if it ever grew into a proper longsword, but Fazra’s preference for the hammer made that seem unlikely. With their squire’s responsibility taken care of, they hung the sword belt on a hook behind their room’s door, shed the brigandine of green dyed leather that they wore, and went downstairs to enjoy the celebration that they and Fazra had brought.   
When they came through the door from the stairs, Fazra’s voice immediately boomed, “A drink for my squire, there ‘e is now!” A cheer went up and Malakel grinned back at the crowd as a mug was shoved into their hands. They drained it in one go, to applause, and a few cries of astonishment, given their size, and let themself get swallowed by the crowd to join the dancing and singing of the night. 

It was a colorful crowd, both in personality and literally, as everyone had dressed in their finest clothes to celebrate. Mothers and fathers thanked the paladin and her squire for chasing away the hag that threatened their children. A few more solemnly thanked them for the vengeance they brought, and Malakel took these with more grace than Fazra did. 

Malakel let drinks be bought for them, and was soon in high spirits, the fae’s future victims forgotten. They danced with several of the young men and women of the town, and let a few kiss them. When particularly deep in the cup, Malakel stole a fiddle from a bard that was plying her trade, and played it like a lute, to general drunken applause. 

After returning it with their apologies(for both theft and music), they decided it was time they called it a night. 

“Peer Fazra!” Malakel called across the room, “I’m going to turn in, don’t wander off drunk.”

Fazra was in the middle of an arm wrestle with the town’s blacksmith, who was nearly as large as her. By way of answer, she picked up a discarded heel of bread from the table and threw it at them without looking. Malakel swatted it away, thanked the innkeep for his hospitality, and waved as what was left of the revelers raised their glasses to them on their way out. They made their unsteady way up the stairs and into bed, and nothing felt so nice.


End file.
